Bill Gates is the richest person in the world, with a net worth of $86 billion, according to Forbes. Warren Buffett, arguably the greatest investor of all time, has a net worth of $76 billion. In addition to a friendship and commitment to charitable causes, Microsoft (symbol MSFT) co-founder Gates and Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.B) chairman Buffett share an affinity for relying on big, solid dividend stocks as the foundation of a buy-and-hold portfolio. We sifted through the respective holdings of Gates and Buffett looking for dividend stocks with a promising combination of value, yield and dividend growth. Keep in mind that these are not simply the stocks with the highest yields. After all, there's more to long-term dividend investing than that. Notes Harvey Malovich, co-founder of dividend-tracking website Longrundata.com, of our 10 stock picks: "While some of their yields are low, it's their dividend growth rates that make them shine"...
Look no further than American Express (AXP) to understand just how serious Warren Buffett is about investing for the long haul. The decision to buy Apple (AAPLL) shares last year was likely made by one of Buffett's stock-picking lieutenants. Buffett famously watched Coca-Cola (KO) for 52 years before investing in the stock. Ecolab (ECL) provides water treatment and other industrial-scale maintenance services. Berkshire’s stake can be traced back to the lifeline that Buffett threw to General Electric (GE) in 2008. After reading IBM’s (IBM) annual reports for more than 50 years without buying a single share, he was finally swayed. Shipping giant UPS (UPS) has long enjoyed a wide moat that protects it from would-be competitors. Tracing its roots back to a single drugstore founded in 1901, Walgreens (WBA) has boosted its dividend every year since 1975. Buffett’s Berkshire seemingly threw in the towel on Walmart (WMT) last year, selling off most of its stake by the end of 2016. Waste Management (WM) controls 30% of the waste collection market, 47% of the landfill market and 63% of the waste transportation market.